


in pieces

by archieknight



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Canon Typical Violence, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Polyamory Negotiations, Soulmate AU, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, major character death but it was riko so who cares
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-27
Updated: 2018-04-27
Packaged: 2019-04-28 13:55:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,146
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14450685
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/archieknight/pseuds/archieknight
Summary: Was it this difficult for everyone, or were they all just so broken that their pieces couldn’t fit the way destiny wanted anymore?





	in pieces

Until the day Riko broke his hand, Kevin had thought he was his soulmate. His whole life he had had a small black mark on his hip bone of a knife, a little bigger than his two tattoo. Riko knew it existed, and all it did was feed his ego. He himself did not have a soulmate identifying mark, but was so sure of himself that he was Kevin’s soulmate. That was just the way Riko’s sick and twisted mind worked, the idea that soulmates weren’t always requited wasn’t unfathomable to him. _What’s the point in a soulmate if they won’t love you back?_ Kevin had thought.

But now he knew Riko wasn’t his soulmate. But if not him, then who? Kevin couldn’t imagine spending his life with anyone else, and not just because of the mark. If fate was to will anyone together wouldn’t it be him and Riko? Sometimes he thought that he was the only one who would ever love Riko, so it must be true. He realised it wasn’t when he left the Ravens. He realised this was not what fate had wanted for him, and he guessed he had to accept it.

The thoughts were easy to push away when he was preoccupied re-learning Exy with his right hand, and maybe he could forget Riko. And besides, he was at PSU now. He didn’t need to think about soulmates when he was playing, but the thought itched at him sometimes. Like when he was running drills and he saw the black outline of a pencil on Aaron’s index finger, or when Dan and Matt pressed their forearms together where their respective marks were. 

Once he found out, he wished he never had. 

He was in the locker rooms when Seth was thrown against the metal with a clang. He turned around to see Andrew holding a knife to Seth’s throat, smile wide and malicious. His hazel eyes had gone dark in a way that shouldn’t have reminded Kevin of Riko. Luckily, he could distract himself with his gaze set on the knife’s gleam. 

Andrew was speaking through gritted teeth, and Kevin felt like the ground was turning beneath him and couldn’t concentrate on his words. He fiddled with the hem of his jersey, pulling it down over his mark. He could tell himself it wasn’t Andrew, but all of it seemed too convenient. With everything that had to happen for him to end up here, it could only be fate, though he was starting to like the idea even less. 

Kevin had found out that Andrew kept his knives under his armbands from Aaron, but he wondered if his mark was under there too. He wanted to ask Aaron about his, which he had no way of hiding, it being on his finger, but rubbed over it with his thumb whenever he thought. Maybe he could ask Nicky, who would be more open about the idea, being open about… pretty much everything. But he wouldn’t know what to say if they asked about his. He could tell them he didn’t have one, or that it was for Thea. He couldn’t tell them who he thought it was for, he couldn’t tell anyone. 

And he didn’t.

-  
Nathaniel Abram Wesninski was born without a soulmark. His mother had told him it was for the best, that soulmates only complicated things, that love like that would put him in danger. Her soulmark was a treble clef below her collarbone, but the skin was viciously torn by his father’s knife. 

At 13, after seeing a girl whose soulmark was a crescent moon, he had taken a ballpoint pen and drew a sun on his arm where hers was. He’s just wanted to understand how it felt to have one, maybe imagine that one day he could. When his mother caught him, she scrubbed his arm clean and red raw. As she did, she berated him for even entertaining the idea. Her words still echoed in him. 

“Your father didn’t have a soulmark either,” she had said. “You do not need one. Abram, you,” the scratch of the flannel on his burning skin tingled as a memory on his forearm, “need to stay alive.”

Abram decided he didn’t want a soulmate anyway. The idea terrified him. Nothing in his life was permanent, so of course he could never have a soulmate. He did know that it didn’t rule out love, even if it was not true, his mother had warned him of that too. Untrue love was just as dangerous, like his father had been for her. Dangerous. 

But he fell in love.

In the year his whole life changed, the year he became Neil Josten, he fell in love (with Andrew Minyard no less). It wasn’t until after Baltimore that he saw what Andrew’s soulmark was, and his heart dropped when he realised Andrew had one. Andrew had a soulmate and it wasn’t him. The mark was a full black silhouette of a chess piece, and Neil didn’t even know how to play chess. 

“Don’t ‘always’ me.”

Those words were like a punch in the gut. Neil was there, stark naked with his scars wrapped in plastic. Completely vulnerable. And Andrew wasn’t even forever, because nothing ever was. But this was something that had felt permanent. Now, he just felt naïve for thinking he’d be allowed to have love. Even now he was safe, he couldn’t have something like what Dan and Matt or Nicky and Erik had. He didn’t get a soulmate. 

-

Andrew was seven when he realised what his soulmark was. Before then, it was just a weird dark mole, of a strange elongated shape on his wrist. He was playing chess with his foster sister, when he picked up the familiar shaped piece. No one had ever spoken to him about soulmates, he was too young, of course. But he knew what they meant. He inspected it, running his finger up it. 

“You can’t move that piece yet,” his foster sister said, “there’s pawns in the way.”

He put it down, and moved the pawn. This was the only move he actually knew, having only begun learning the game that day. After that, his foster sister informed him that it left his king open to her bishop, and he lost the game.

He was in juvie when he decided that, maybe once, he was meant to have a soulmate. Maybe he was supposed to be the king to someone’s queen, but that wasn’t how things turned out. Now, he was too damaged for a soulmate to want him. He didn’t even like girls. A queen? He snorted at the idea. Andrew was not a king, and he felt sorry for the poor girl who had his matching mark. 

People like him weren’t meant to have soulmates. 

He’d found something else entirely though. Neil wasn’t his soulmate, he knew that. He didn’t even know if Neil had a mark;, if he had, Andrew had never seen it. Maybe he once had, but it was buried under all that scar tissue. His eyes trailed from Neil’s lips to the plastic covering his scars. _Maybe it was here,_ he thought, fingers grazing over the burn that covered his shoulder. _Or there,_ he grazed the scar on his abdomen, following the line across his hip bone. 

“Don’t ‘always’ me.”

He wasn’t allowed this. This feeling in his chest that wanted to drag him forward, let him collide into Neil. He held himself back, a comfortable foot of space between them. He didn’t deserve this. He couldn’t have someone fall for him, he wasn’t someone who could be loved. 

But he wanted it. 

-

Eventually, the pieces fell into place.

Kevin had stumbled into the dorm reeking of vodka and something sterile, but what caught his eye was the bandage on his cheek. Eyes drooping and legs ready to give way, Kevin looked at Neil. Something in his eyes glinted with dare. 

Neil made his way over the Kevin, slowly, and reached a hand to the bandage. He carefully pulled the tape away to reveal a chess piece where the number two used to be. His heart stopped. Kevin was Andrew’s soulmate. Did Kevin even know what he’d done? Was it fate that led him to get that tattoo? 

But he’d done it. Soulmarks aside, it was an act of defiance against Riko. It was Kevin claiming his life for his own. 

“You did it,” he said, trying not to choke on the words.

“Let Riko be King. Most coveted, most protected. He’ll sacrifice every piece he has to protect his throne. Whatever. Me? I’m going to be the deadliest piece on the board.” Kevin said in slurred words, with the confidence of the man inspiring an army and the cadence of a sleepy toddler. 

“Queen,” Andrew said, appearing behind Neil. He watched Andrew step across the room to Kevin. He grasped Kevin’s chin to look at the tattoo, his finger even hovering over the shape. “He is going to be furious.” 

Kevin and Andrew were standing impossibly close, and Neil couldn’t take his eyes off them. “Fuck him. Fuck all of them. Waste of time to be angry. They should be afraid.”

“Hell hath no fury,” muttered Andrew. 

“Andrew,” Neil said. He stepped back from Kevin, hand falling away from his face. He knew what Neil was thinking, the thought made his wrist feel like it was burning. 

“Now this is where it gets fun,” Andrew said, pulling his armband up just enough to reveal the black chess piece on his wrist that matched the one on Kevin’s face.

Kevin had to lean himself against the door to stop himself falling on his ass. “Is that-” he breathed out heavily. He’d known Andrew was his soulmate for over a year, but he was sure it would never be requited. Confirmation like that made him feel like he was falling, his whole body weightless and dizzy. “How the-”

Neil could hear his own heart beating loud in his ears, but Andrew’s voice cut through the sound. “This does not have to change anything,” He said.

“Of course not, you and Neil-” Kevin thought out loud, his mind buzzing with jumbled words. He’d thought something like this would have sobered him up, but it just made his head fuzzier and his legs shakier. He pulled himself back on track. “Neil,” he said as he let out a breath.

“It’s okay,” Neil said.

Kevin shook his head, “No, Neil. No it’s not.”

Neil’s shoulders slumped a bit, and stepped back from the other two slightly, teetering from one foot to the other. “It really is. I don’t have one.”

“You don’t have a soulmark?” Kevin’s face fell with the words. 

Neil shook his head. 

Heart heavy, Kevin locked his fingers around the back of his neck and breathed deeply. Neil looked from him to Andrew, whose face was as inscrutable as ever, but Neil could tell he was thinking. Maybe there was a slight squint in his eyes, or an even more distant look. But he was definitely turning it over in his mind. 

“What do we do?” Neil asked. 

Andrew raised his head when Neil spoke. “We let this run its course, what else can we do?” 

“I’m tired of countdowns, of knowing things have to end.”

“Then we pretend this never happened,” Kevin suggested, walking past them to sit down. His head stopped spinning a little when he did, but he was struggling to keep his eyes open now there was no nausea to keep him from nodding off. 

“They always talk about it like you’re supposed to know the moment you meet them,” Neil mused. “Like it’s some magical moment. Then again, we can’t rule out magic and destiny here- Andrew had the mark first.” 

“Be quiet,” Andrew snapped. 

Neil scoffed, “So we’re not going to talk about it?” 

“Kevin, show us yours,” Andrew said, walking nearer to throw himself on the beanbag opposite him. Neil hovered above him, peering at Kevin when he slouched in the beanbag and pulled the corner of his waistband down a few inches. On his hip was a tiny black-lined image of a knife. 

Neil snorted, “Well, that makes sense.”

“Neil,” Andrew said, his voice harsh with warning. 

“What am I supposed to say, Andrew? How am I supposed to keep quiet when I find out your soulmate is someone else?”

“This is… strange for all of us,” Andrew said. “But it doesn’t change anything between me and you.”

“And what is that?” Neil bit back, refusing to return Andrew’s reserve tone.

Andrew didn’t respond. 

Neil didn’t even have a soulmate, and never thought he would. This never bothered him, but seeing Andrew find his made him feel like he was being stabbed in the gut. And that is was Kevin made him hurt, because of course it was him. It made sense, that they were meant to be together. Kevin was there before Neil and would be there after, maybe it was dumb to think Andrew would ever love him.

He felt so close to them both, yet so far away. 

Neil went into their room with a slam of the door. Andrew turned to Kevin, who didn’t even stir at the sound. He wasn’t sure when he passed out but his head was flopped against his shoulder and mouth agape with tiny snores. He sighed. That drunken drooling disaster was his soulmate, just his luck. 

Andrew cocked his head to the side a bit, studying his face and supposing that he was attractive. That mattered, maybe, but that didn’t make him soulmate material. But what might is that he meant something to Andrew, being under his protection and what anyone else would call a friend. Neil was the closest thing he’d had to a soulmate or boyfriend- God, he hated those words. He hated the whole idea, he hated the stupid marks and he hated how much he liked Neil.

He needed a cigarette.

-

When Andrew woke up, Kevin was still passed out on the beanbag. He noticed that his shirt was riding up and the knife on his hip bone in clear view. Looking at it was disorientating, so he grabbed a blanket from the couch and threw it over him. Usually, Kevin slept like the dead, but this time, of all times, he stirred.

He squinted up at Andrew, then around the room. Not anxious, just observant. He stretched himself awake, groaning when he tried to get off the floor. When he pulled his arms up, he must have had a realisation. 

“Oh fuck,” he said. He touches his hand quickly to the bandage on his face. Then he checked the time, “Oh _fuck._ ”

“We still have another two and a half hours before we have to be at the bus,” Andrew said. 

“Where’s Neil?” Kevin asked. His hair was a mess, and the creases of the beanbag had printed into his cheek when he slept. He reeked of alcohol and sweat still. 

“He’s in his room, it is still early. You need to get your act together,” Andrew said. 

Kevin furrowed his eyebrows, “Excuse me?”

“Have an aspirin and a shower, you need it.”

“I’m not even hungover,” Kevin insisted.

“Then you are still drunk.”

Kevin breathed out into his hand and sniffed, muttering under his breath. “You know just because we’re soulmates doesn’t mean you have to look after me.”

“I know I don’t, but this is important to you. We can talk about _that_ after the game,” Andrew said, and Kevin wanted to rip his smile off his own face. He couldn’t like Andrew, he couldn’t hurt Neil like that. He cared about Neil just as much. 

Now he felt hungover, sick to his stomach. 

By the time Neil saw him, Kevin was showered and functioning, leaving him to wonder if last night had really happened because Kevin seemed unphased considering the state he was in. The only confirmation that it was real was the queen tattoo on his cheekbone.

Seeing Erik in the stands for Nicky, and the soulmarks on Aaron and Katelyn’s fingers wrapped around each other, or the anonymous black plus symbol on Wymack’s hand, only made Neil feel worse. All this love, surrounding even people as broken as the Foxes, surely he deserved it too? 

He tried to mimic Kevin’s unshakeable confidence. There was no time for soulmates, or not-soulmates. They had to win; they’d come this far, and Neil wouldn’t let it be ruined. 

-

The Foxes won. Riko was dead. Neil was safe.

He had a chance at a future now, and the wave of possibility came over him hard enough to knock him down. He never needed soulmates before, and now he had so much more to live for. He looked down the aisle of the bus, spotting his friends faces light up with glee. Everyone was giddy and laughing with disbelief. He was in love with the Foxes, in their fights and in their victories, he’d found a home with them. 

He didn’t just deserve love, he already had it. 

“Wipe that smile of your face,” Andrew jabbed at him, but didn’t mean it. 

“Do it for me,” Neil replied back easily, his smile even brighter. 

Andrew pulled at his shirt until he was inches from his face, “Why do you not have one?” 

“I don’t know, Andrew. It doesn’t matter.” Neil said, not taking his eyes off Andrew’s lips.

“Yes it does.”

“It only matters if you want me to be your soulmate, and I’m not.” 

Andrew sighed and pushed him away, slumping back into his seat. Neil was pushing his buttons again, he’d hardly had any time since the last night to think it over. He didn’t like not knowing where he stood. So he decide to answer Andrew’s question. 

“My father didn’t have one either,” He admitted. “And he’s dead now. Maybe it’s because some people just don’t have one.”

“I refuse to believe that some higher power determined that I was to have a soulmate, but not you. You are implying he didn’t have one because he is a bad person, which just cannot be true. Even the most vile people on the planet have soulmarks.”

Andrew remembered the black outline of a bird on Drake’s kneecap, and was sure that whether somebody had a soulmate was not determined by their moral values. 

“Why then?” Neil asked.

“Perhaps fate got it wrong.”

Neil raised an eyebrow, “Are you saying it should have been you?”

Andrew breathed out his nose heavily, kicking up his feet to rest on the back of the seat in front of him. “No. That is not my choice.”

“You should talk to Kevin. Though, it’s not his choice either.”

-

“You know,” said Kevin, “Riko didn’t have a soulmark either.”

“Is that supposed to be comforting?” Neil scoffed. The statement had came out of nowhere. They were both sat in their dorm doing homework and not talking to each other. They’d done a lot of that, not talking to each other.

“I don’t know what it was supposed to be,” Kevin sighed, picking at the loose thread on his sleeve.

“He didn’t have one and he’s dead now. My father didn’t have one and he’s dead too. Things aren’t exactly looking good for me.” Neil snapped, his chest rattling with anxiety.

Kevin pursed his lips, “But you’re safe now.”

“Am I?”

“I don’t know, maybe…” Kevin muttered, cleared his throat and then continued, “Do you think you don’t have one because you were _supposed_ to die?”

Neil choked, “Fucking hell, Kevin, you-”

“No, no, no. Not like that, just-” He insisted, only stopping briefly to think about his next words. “You’ve had so many close calls, so many times you could have died. Maybe you don’t have a soulmark because you…”

“So what? I’ve just defied fate?”

Kevin let out a small smile, one that wasn’t supposed to happen, almost guilty. “I mean, if anyone is going to defy fate…”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You’re impossible, Neil. That’s what I mean.”

Impossible was the best word Kevin could think to use, but not the only one. Neil was so much at once, but acted like he was nothing. Sometimes Kevin wanted to shake him and tell him how amazing he was, and yell at him to start acting like it. 

He couldn’t stop thinking about how he could have ruined things for Neil and Andrew. They seemed… Not happy, he didn’t expect that. But they were better together. And he couldn't stop thinking that he fucked that up for them, two of the people he cared most about, all because of the stupid tattoos. Was it this difficult for everyone, or were they all just so broken that their pieces couldn’t fit the way destiny wanted anymore?

“Are things still okay? With you and Andrew,” Kevin asked, turning back to his history homework to make the question seem more casual.

“Don’t worry you’re still next in line,” Neil murmured bitterly.

Kevin swallowed hard, “That’s not what I meant.”

“You keep saying that, that it’s not what you meant. If it’s not, then stop fucking saying it,” Neil bit, voice harsh. 

They went quiet and tense for a long moment, neither of them even thinking to breath. Eventually Kevin stood up, picking up his books and saying, “If there is anything I can do to fix this, I will. I will not get in the way.”

“I don’t think there is anything you can do,” Neil said under his breath. Kevin left after that, leaving Neil alone with his work and his thoughts. 

The whole thing was giving him a headache. Maybe it would be better if Andrew left him for Kevin, soulmates can’t be wrong, can they? But he’d gone through so much to be happy here, and it was working. He had his family, and his future, was he being selfish to want this too? 

_Your father didn’t have a soulmark either. You do not need one. Abram, you need to stay alive._

His mother’s words rung in his head, but what did they matter now? He’d avoided death, he was safe. Well, he was finally starting to feel it but what Kevin had said was making him feel like he was living on borrowed time. Maybe it was true, maybe he’d defied death and fate. He felt like he had. Only someone who had either had several skirmishes with death, or another 2 page essay to write, could be this exhausted.

It was a relief when Andrew got home, he could stop thinking about it now, probably. Andrew wasn’t in the chattiest mood so he wouldn’t bring it up, but it gave Neil time to think. Or it didn’t, because the moment he was through the door and sure no one was home, he walked over to where Neil was sitting and said, “Yes or no?”

“Yes,” Neil said, leaning up to kiss Andrew, who immediately wrapped his hand into Neil’s hair and kissed him back. Just like that, time stopped existing. It was just Andrew’s body against him and his mind couldn’t wander far. 

When time came back, Andrew’s arms were resting over Neil’s shoulders, and Neil’s were still by his side. Andrew’s forehead hit Neil’s lightly, lips still close enough to feel each other’s breath. He was so close that Neil’s freckles crossed over into each other in a blur, but his bright eyes still stood out under his eyelashes. 

Neil didn’t think this is how not-soulmates felt around each other. 

-

Kevin had never been up on the roof with Andrew. He wasn’t scared of heights, but it still made him uneasy. He was only up there because he was sure Andrew was avoiding him. They said they’d talk about it after the game, and maybe he was just too caught up in victory to worry about it, but it had been days and he hadn’t managed to catch Andrew alone. So he actively made his way up to where he knew Andrew would be. 

He was sat on the ledge, a cigarette hanging out his mouth. His eyes were distant and his face pale, the hood on his matching coat was pulled up over his head. It was only just starting to rain but Kevin was shivering. He raised an eyebrow slightly when he realised Kevin was there, “We should talk.” 

“Yeah,” Kevin’s breath forced its way out with the words. He walked up to the ledge and peered over. “That’s not as bad as I thought. I still don’t know how you spend so much time up here.”

“Because you got the smoke alarm in the dorm fixed,” Andrew offered.

“And the roof is the only practical smoking area, I see,” Kevin nodded, he sat down next to Andrew. 

Andrew put out the cigarette prematurely. It could have been out of consideration for Kevin, or he just got bored of it. “You want to talk about this, yes?” He said, holding onto the edge of his armband where his soulmark was, his thumb pressing over it. He could feel his pulse quickening against him, but he wasn’t anxious. He might have been scared- he’d already let Neil in, and it had felt like he was falling off the side of Fox Tower. He couldn’t do that again, it wasn’t safe.

But he wanted to. Oh God, he wanted to. He wanted to let go of common sense, of logic and the barriers he had around himself. When he was just protecting Kevin, he could still watch his own back. But falling for him left him vulnerable. 

“Yes,” Kevin replied, nodding and the feeling stupid for nodding. “I want to know what I can do to… fix this.”

“There is no fixing it,” Andrew said, “We cannot change what our marks are, we just have to figure out what we do now we know.” 

“And that is…”

“Up for discussion.”

Kevin sighed a laugh, “Okay, debate club, first argument?”

Andrew breathed in deeply, the dusty air that the rain brought up filling his lungs. He wanted to grab Kevin and kiss him to shut him up, but had to rationalize because that was not going to help. “As I see it, we have three options. One: Neil and I continue as we were, and eventually the impermanence of it breaks us.”

“Cross out option one,” Kevin said. He couldn’t bear thinking about Neil worrying constantly about being temporary, when he’d finally learned permanence. 

“Two: I suddenly lose all sense, and leave Neil for you, with only the guidance of a misshapen mole on my wrist.”

“That doesn’t sound good either,” Kevin frowned.

Andrew was flicking at the corner of his packet of cigarettes mindlessly like he wanted another, he stopped when he said. “Neil aside, would you want to?”

“What?” Kevin asked.

“Would you want to…” Andrew struggled over the words to describe what Kevin could have with him, what Neil already had with him. It was different, and Andrew didn’t know how to put it into words, “...be with me?”

“I- I don’t know,” Kevin stuttered. He trusted Andrew, he could talk to him, and he was attracted to him, but he didn’t know what else he needed to feel for that to happen. He didn’t understand it. It was hardly that simple. “Would you?”

“I hate you,” Andrew said simply.

“That doesn’t answer my question, Minyard.”

“I think it does.”

“So, you don’t want to? You could just say that.”

“I never said that,” He muttered, favouring side-eyeing Kevin to staring out over the horizon. 

Kevin sighed, “You’re impossible, Andrew.”

“This was never going to be easy, was it?” Andrew turned to him. He’d clearly thought more into how this conversation would go, whereas Kevin was too busy wondering if it would ever happen. Even so, Kevin had had more time to think about this, having suspected it was Andrew for over a year.

“What’s option three?” Kevin asked.

Andrew let out a tiny smirk, “Exactly what it sounds like.”

“I’m not following,” Kevin said, eyebrows furrowed. 

“You, me, Neil. No complications, we let fate fix what it broke.” 

Kevin stopped to think about that, looking out over the campus. It could work, he guessed. He didn’t know how Neil would feel about it, would he want to date Neil? Would Neil want to date him? There were so many things that had to be right for all three of them to work, and Kevin had no idea where to start. He was right when he thought that they were all too broken for to fit together how fate had wanted, this wasn’t quite what he meant by it though. 

“Is that what you want?” asked Kevin.

Andrew stood up, “I guess we will find out.” He said before starting to walk away.

-

That night, Kevin didn’t come back to the dorm until he was picking Neil up for night practise. He hesitated at the door for a while, unsure about how he felt being in the same room as them both. When he mustered up enough courage, he walked through the door. 

Neil was rushing around, sweeping up his duffel to throw it over his shoulder before he greeted Kevin. “Hey, sorry. We’re almost ready.”

“Where’s Andrew?” asked Kevin. 

Andrew turned the corner out of their room. “Right there,” Neil said, smiling at him. His jeans were distractingly low on his hips and his hair pushed messily out of his face in a way that could only be Neil’s doing. Kevin was kind of frozen looking at him, but he snapped himself out of it.

“Ready?” he checked. Neil nodded and made his way to the door, throwing Andrew’s keys at him on the way. 

Andrew was walking towards the car when he said, “Neil and I talked about it.”

Kevin could only manage an anxiously interested ‘oh?’ and waiting for them to continue. 

“And,” Neil took over the conversation, opening the door and shuffling into the backseat of Andrew’s car. “The thing is, this is all new to me. Andrew was the first person I’d ever really felt attracted to, which is of course what made this all hit harder. I suppose I’m just not wired like everyone else, in the way of attraction. People don’t just catch my eye and then I develop feelings… I don’t know, Renee explained this better.” 

“I’m following, keep going,” Kevin encouraged. Andrew then started the car and headed for the stadium. 

Neil smiled quickly before talking again. “Anyway, the way that this felt, and the fact I’d never felt anything like it before, made me think maybe I didn’t need a soulmark… Because I had him. But after finding out, I was hurt. I felt stupid. But you, Kevin.” He leaned back in his seat and took a breath in, “I care about you in the same way- not like I care about Matt or Nicky or any of the other Foxes. Not like family. And I think, what Andrew suggested, I think it could work. So, I’m in if you are.”

“Okay,” Kevin nodded, glancing to Andrew. 

Andrew watched Neil and Kevin practise from the stands. The warm lights and harsh orange gave him an odd nostalgic feeling of a timeless place. That’s what these practices were to Andrew, a place where time didn’t exist. It didn’t matter to him like it did to the other two, but he’d always used the time to think. Back when he was on his meds, it was the few sober hours he’d get. He could turn things over in his head uninhibited, and that’s what he did now.

He watched the two run drills with no interest in the sports behind them, he supposed he just liked to watch them move. They had a connection that Andrew couldn’t quite understand, and he wondered if maybe Neil was supposed to wear the chess piece on Andrew’s wrist. He thought it made more sense, those two together. 

Neil needed Kevin, he thought. Well, not needed as such, but there was a piece of Kevin that fit him so well. They clicked together and worked in harmony on and off the court, but Andrew was far more interested in the latter. 

As days and weeks passed, they learned to click their pieces together without breaking any. It started fragmented; tension when Neil and Kevin practised because suddenly those tiny touches over racquets were electric shocks, and Andrew slowly letting Kevin into his mind more. It was a cautious endeavor of soft touches and honest words. It was slow, but they didn’t get impatient, each new step and each new confession and each new touch was a thrill. 

-

The first time Kevin and Neil slept in the same bed, it felt unreal. They’d never thought something would feel so easy, rolling in refusal to get up and pulling each other closer. They were only just waking up, with mid-morning light slicing through the room through a space in the curtain. 

Neil ran his fingertips over Kevin, which he felt as a light tickle but was too lazy to argue. He smiled at the sensation, looking over to Neil, all messy hair and soft eyes. Neil traced the short lines of Kevin’s soulmark, studying it. 

“Does it still bother you?”

Neil hummed shortly in thought, “No. I think this is what was supposed to happen.” 

“So fate-defying is a nice boost to your ego?” Kevin teased, turning on his side so he could look into Neil’s eyes properly. 

“It’s pretty cool: Neil Josten, defier of fate,” he joked back.

Kevin let his smile break into a grin and rested his forehead against Neil’s. He reached an arm forwards to run his hands through the hair at the back of Neil’s head. His eyes fluttered briefly closed at the feeling, and Kevin made a mental note to never forget how he looked when he did that and to get him to at every next opportunity.

“This one,” Kevin pressed his fingertip to a mole on Neil’s neck, “that’s your soulmark for me.”

“What?” Neil laughed softly, “Why?”

“Because I like it, it’s mine now.” He replied, then pressed his lips to it gently. 

“What’s it supposed to be?” Neil asked.

“An Exy ball, duh,” he replied.

Neil surprised himself with how loud his laugh was in the quiet of the morning- it was just so nice to see Kevin allow himself to be ridiculous. 

Kevin pulled away and inspected his neck, looking for another mole. There was probably one under the mark on his collarbone he’d left last night, but he skipped past that and chose the little freckle on his shoulder, “That one’s for Andrew.”

“It’s significantly smaller,” Neil noted. 

“So is Andrew,” he almost whispered. 

Neil imitated his whisper, “He probably heard that from the kitchen, you’d better sleep with one eye open tonight.”

“He wouldn’t wait until I slept,” Kevin replied. “Do you reckon we can get him to make breakfast? I don’t want to get up.”

“If you want pop tarts, then maybe.”

Kevin yawned, “I’d rather die.” Neil watched him stretch himself awake, rubbing his hands over his eyes and sighing. It was a long process, Kevin getting out of bed. Neil had half the mind to grab him and drag him out. 

When Neil managed to get himself and Kevin out of bed, Andrew was nodding off on the couch. Neil noticed first, turning to Kevin and holding a finger to his lips. Kevin looked confused for moment before he saw Andrew. “Oh okay,” he whispered. 

“Drew?” Neil said, a few feet back from where Andrew was slouched. Then repeated it louder.

Andrew awoke with a start, only untensing when he scanned the room to see only Kevin and Neil. “Asshole,” he muttered. 

“Sorry,” Neil said, sitting down next to him. “You didn’t sleep out here, did you?” 

“No, I slept in your bed since you two took mine,” he responded, shuffling up. Kevin sat next to Neil and turned on the TV to the news, clearly considering that if Andrew had to hear Exy this early in the morning he might _actually_ kill him in his sleep. 

The next out of bed was Nicky, who greeted Kevin first with a polite, “Jesus Christ, Day, you’re the worst third wheel I’ve ever seen.”

He wasn’t a third wheel though, maybe if they were one of those ridiculous tandem bikes, he could be. The weren’t cogs in a machine either, only working when they all fit together. They weren’t puzzle pieces to form a perfect picture. They were chess pieces, a strategy working best when together, and they could take your king down piece by piece.


End file.
